As The World Falls Down -Ely Lavellan au story
by Elystaa
Summary: Two years ago Elystaa Lavellan was born again after dying. Not really but as he said it might have been kinder... or maybe not. Not if she takes that final leap for what it is she really needs with every fiber of her being ... her heart.


As The World Falls Down

Two years ago Elystaa Lavellan was born again after dying. Not really but as he said it might have been kinder... or maybe not. Not if she takes that final leap for what it is she really needs with every fiber of her being ... her heart.

"Your forces have failed. Leave now and tell the Qunari to trouble me no further." Two echoing sentences and the most influential woman in Thedas couldn't move, couldn't speak. The words themselves held no mystical powers or sway over her body or essence but rather the voice that said them held dominion over her heart. It beat frantically inside the flesh and bone cage of her chest. Ever contrary, it then bid her to weave her way through the small grove of frozen Qunari Barriasad. Each warrior poised in the moment of attack. Their faces forever etched in a snarl of fury. Their weapons aimed and lifted at a target no longer there. The magic used to do this time and again had to come from an immense well of energy. One warrior after the other fell by the same spell cast on the cusp of the previous one. From what little Elystaa knew about mages she knew, the caster should have been a melted puddle of mage exhaustion. Instead, she could hear him calmly stating his directive to the Qun, so near to her that she could make out every overheard word, clearly.

She carefully wound her way through the twisted maze of sharp-pointed weapons and towering shields. When she reached out and tested one of the stone blades she found it still lethally sharp. Forever encased in granite, a labyrinth of frozen faces mocked her heart, making her doubt her steely resolve. The very faces of her consequences stared down at her, crowned in horns and armor. She chose her people over the alliance with the Qun, she would still choose the Chargers.

But she had to wonder even if she hadn't, would she still have not been a threat in the eyes of the Qun? And simply found herself here once again? A dangerous weapon that was no longer needed? They considered her a Saarebas despite having never slung a spell in her life.

Elystaa's magic was to craft The Game not to craft curses. Her hands were calloused from bow and fletching not from stave and fire.

She gave Viddasala one chance to turn around and rescind the Qun's orders, but they chose this fight. But by all the Creators she would hunt them down and finish it! That little bubble of rage allowed her to raise her gaze to each set of onyx centered eyes and quickly pass them by.

With her foot finally upon the first dusty step she found herself in the combined shadow of two noble harts that bracketed the dry stairs, she felt the initial stirrings of apprehension. Down the outside legs of one of the guardian statues ran a crystalline brook from the piazza above, drawing her eyes to the confrontation playing out there.

The voice that nightly haunted her dreams, just out of reach. Elystaa didn't know if her heart could withstand another goodbye. The last time her wolf left she nearly died, she threw herself against her enemies recklessly one after the other hoping for … she didn't know what for.

Then he spoke again. Deliberately she lifted her other foot to the next step as if she wasn't already magnetically drawn to the powerful tone that resonated through her. Against the bright sun, she could make out the horned figure of Viddasala and the bright, reflective silhouette of a tall Elvhen man dressed the golden armor she had seen in Fen'Harel's Tower.

"Solas." Elystaa breathed out the name she had been holding inside herself for just under two years. Even with elven hearing, she knew he could not have heard the exhalation from where she stood. The burbling stream and whispering wind would have stolen them away far before they could reach him.

Her dry mouth made it hard to swallow her hope, as she sprinted up the last few steps. Her side ached and bled freely where a war axe had bitten into her somewhere along the pathways between Eluvians. They had run out of healing potions long before that wound was inflicted and lyrium potions not long after the health mixtures.

This mission, she had to admit, might be her last. As she took in the situation unfolding before her, she felt a shiver of premonition race down her spine.

The vision of his dark cloaked back and Viddasala, as she hefted her spear at him, turned her blood to lava in her veins. At the same time, fear crushed her chest and stole her breath in a painful wave. She couldn't come so close to seeing him, to holding him only to lose him again. She felt curiously separated from herself as she listened to her own thin-soled boots slap across the wet uneven stone slabs that had once been a beautifully smooth courtyard. Unarmed and injured, Elystaa barreled into the side of the spear-wielding Qunari mage.

She did the only thing she could think to do.

Elystaa once more unleashed the mark.

With all her being, she knew this would be the last time she could withstand the forces at work within the swirling green eddies.

The Fade was truly no place for mortals.

If this was to be it, if this was to be her end, she wanted him to know she still felt the same and always would … "Ar lath mA VHENAN!" and when the darkness reached out to her, she reached out and embraced the blackness.

She was wet. Her armor and clothing chafed against her cold skin. Elystaa shivered violently, she felt the lick of frost deep inside her muscles and bones. Even shivering was beyond her ability at this point each joint locked in frigid place. It was everywhere, everywhere but her marked hand, that burned like a small star stuck into her palm. Let her burn between the cold and the hot. Let the twin pains consume her because pain meant she still lived.

Cool soothing fingers slid between her digits on the accursed hand, calming the fire, squelching it to a slow simmering glow. A familiar wave of spirit healing energy washed through Elystaa. Her eyelashes fluttered against her cheek before guiding her eyes to open upon a scene she had seen so many times she had lost count. Solas knelt with her head pillowed on his lap, his brow furrowed in concentration. She knew the signs so well she could read how badly she was injured just by looking at how deep the shadows gathered across his face. And, the signs were bad. The bridge of his nose folded up on itself deeply, the corners of his nostrils were raised in a snarl reserved for the worst of patients and if he clenched his teeth much harder he might crack them under the pressure.

His face smoothed out into a moment of peace as his hand came up to brush one of her ever-errant locks of hair from her face. A habit from a much happier time despite the breach and despite the danger, they faced every day.

"That should give us some time." The sad smile that accompanied the words nearly shattered what was left of Elystaa's already broken heart. "I suspect you have questions." His melodious voice was soft, softer than she had ever heard it as if he expected her to fear him. To loath him and had accepted it.

"Always but… I couldn't let them kill you because I love you. Solas, Fen' Harel or Dread Wolf. Whoever you are. I don't care what you are called, long as I can call you Vhenan." Elystaa's normally rich voice, more akin to singing lively round songs than yelling commands, crackled as she spoke. It was so full of longing and pain it had no choice but to buckle under the strain of those twin weights.

A simple grin transformed him into a much younger elf and the corners of his eyes remained crinkled slightly as he made a low "hmmm" in his throat before placing his idle hand upon her larynx and he sent another tingling surge of healing energies through her sore body. "Well Done, Ma' lath… I was Solas first. 'Fen'Harel' came later… An insult I took as a badge of pride. The Dread Wolf inspired hope in my friends and fear in my enemies…" A small weak laugh escaped him as his thumb brushed across her chilled skin. "Not unlike 'Inquisitor' I suppose. When a title replaces your name …" He added with a shrug that bespoke little of all the burdens those titles entailed. For once at a loss, for the eloquent words that normally tumbled so freely from his mouth.

Seconds before the pleasant sensations of his magic inside her body abruptly cut off, the smile that only shone out through his eyes died. That light was snuffed out, by cruel reality. Yet he didn't pull away, dropping her into the cold puddle. Instead, he sat frozen by indecision just as if he was one of the stiffened Qunari below. "And now you know. What is the old Dalish curse? 'May the Dread Wolf take you?"

Elystaa felted her bruised face stretch into a wide smile and forced herself to sit up against him, despite the pain and place her forehead on his downcast one. His eyes had gritted closed in his supposed guilt. Those stormy blue orbs opened slowly to search through her own elfroot green spheres and into her soul. Eventually, they stopped their quest and simply held hers firmly, sweetly. Nothing in that moment could have stopped Elystaa from quietly pressing her closed lips to his briefly before pulling away to speak.

"Yes, he took my mind, my heart, my body, and my soul. The only thing wanting is if he had somehow managed to take me on the throne." She giggled as she pushed her head against his slightly. The endearment fell from her lips like the years he had been gone had never happened and she melded them to his once more. Slowly he responded, grazing lightly at her plump lower lip. Then he captured it in swiftly growing passion as it always was with him. His hunger often overran the two of them. Sometimes to comical ends.

A snow in at Skyhold had left the inhabitants rambunctious and on more than one occasion during it, Solas and Elystaa had unsuccessfully tried to sneak down and make love on her throne. They admitted to two attempts. Though through the rumor mill it had rapidly become seven and then by the time it had spread through the entire hold it was a nightly endeavor. It became a point they would tease each other lovingly with. Snow-fever does strange things to people.

Slowly their feast came to an end. Their chests rising and lowering quickly against each other's as they took in deep breaths of air their kiss had denied them. Solas' forehead still pressed tightly to Elystaa's, he did not wish to ever remove it. He had unwittingly given her his mark, his power, and his heart. It took him far too long to admit it to himself, but once he did all he wished was that he could protect her from all harm. It killed him inside every day to know that there was a high probability that he would be unable in the end to protect her from… himself. He rolled his brow against hers.

The silence was likely unnerving her, he knew how she thought and the longer the silence reigned the more she would ponder. But! Just to hold her so again, just a little longer. His plans were to save her, but all campaigns could go bad and must be fluid to change. In the grand scheme of it, all saving and transferring one mortal to another reality was a large outpouring of power for something that was in effect a selfish wish. If his strategies were to not happen as planned and he needed to use that delegated portion of mana, he would have no choice. The people must come before his own desires, no matter how much he wanted it to be otherwise. Lifting his chin he pressed his kiss-swollen mouth over her third eye, his fingers still threaded through her ebony hair.

Elystaa cleared her throat, beset unspoken fears and began to stand. Solas, ever gallant, helped her get to her feet. He held her waiting for her to gain her balance as if she was a young halla and he was not the wolf. It occurred to her now he never really was the wolf. Never the stalker of her childhood nightmares. Never the defiler of pretty firsts or any of the other nonsense her Keeper told her. She saw it before but now looking at the man who she loved she knew it. She was certain he could by no means have ever done any of those things. It was simply not in him to do them. With that, the very last of the doubts that clung like cobwebs in her mind fell away.

She had been prepared to love him even if they had once been true, but the truth was far better and infinitely more tragic. To be blamed despite such a sacrifice. He was vilified by the very people he sought with all his being to save. The sadness in his eyes made all the sense to her now. All she lost was her clan. How must it feel to have lost everyone? At least, she knew there were other Dalish clans out there. Even though she knew, Elystaa needed to hear him tell his story to have him trust her with the truth, at long last. "Our legends about you are wrong. All wrong. Ma' serannasal. I saw the stories as we traveled through the Eluvians and Crossroads. Are they true?"

She glanced away from him to the towering Eluvian before her, its reflective surface showed them together. His reflection braced protectively over her shorter stature, her skin, even paler than his, but even magic couldn't replace lost blood so that was to be expected. Her long dark hair falling here and there in wet tendrils from the elaborate twists she lovingly learned from Solas' hands. They both had lost weight and from the darkened circles marring his skin she knew he likely slept less than she did. They both look beaten, tired and in need of the other to bear the weight of the world with she decided.

Solas' long supportive arm ran the length of hers and wrapped around her wrist. He had removed the arm that had deliciously snaked briefly about her waist as he hoisted her to her feet moments before. Their bodies separated at a proper distance, his back straight and his forearm gentlemanly twined with hers. That arm and contact he kept. Elystaa had no intention to extradite herself from his warm grip either. Even through the wet leather of both her duster and his gloves, she could still feel the heat of his body. He had never been that hot before. It made her want to wrap him around herself and never let go.

His eyes approvingly flashed up to hers, but they were sad almost lost. "They are closer than the Dalish legends, though still prone to making me into something more than I am. I am no god, just a very old elf. One who has lived through too many wars and witnessed too much death."

Tears gathered at the corners of her jade-green eyes. "I am so sorry, Solas. What you've seen…" she had to suck in a breath to stop the tears from falling down her cheeks. "I can't imagine. Ma' Vhenan." No matter how she commanded her marked arm to move, to hold him. To cradle him to her bosom and allow him for once to mourn. To cry for all he lost with someone but, it never moved, never twitched. The anchor was becoming worse again, whatever he had done was beginning to fade. "If you had just told me…"

"Then you would carry the same burden I do," He said closing his soul-filled eyes.

"I want to. Ma Ghilan, Vhenan." She said slowly back to him, already knowing he would retreat from the endearment.

Solas' hand slid down her arm and slipped off her elbow as he turned to look out into the silvery mass of the large mirror before them. "I sought to set my people free from slavery to would be gods." He turned back to her and with the lightest of touches traced where Sylaise's vines had once swirled over her eye. "I broke the chains of all who wished to join me. The false gods called me Fen'Harel, and then when they finally went too far…" Solas ripped his lingering fingers away before they betrayed him further by tracing her trembling lips. He knew once he did he would kiss her again and was afraid once he started he wouldn't have the strength to stop. "I formed the veil and banished them forever. Thus freed the Elvehn people and in doing so, destroyed their world." He cast his eyes down like a man condemned.

Even with the healing he had already sent through her body, she could feel the mark sucking her down. Drinking her very life essence by the minute. Though Elystaa wanted to stay as close to Solas as she physically could to comfort him and herself, she began to tire. The roguish elven woman peered about her waterlogged boots for a suitability high slab of stone to sit her weary body on. With her time shortening, she did, at least, want her curiosity assuaged. "You implied we have time and you would answer some questions, Solas?" She asked dragging his attention back from the distant horizon of some long ago day.

"I assume you're keeping my companions at bay? It seems serendipitous that you were able to lead me here, to not only stop the Qunari threat but also calm the mark again. Solas, thank you for that." She smirked to herself when he nodded at her with a raised eyebrow "However, I know you leave little to chance and that must mean you as well as they were able to infiltrate the Inquisition forces. With the Qun being a religious philosophy, their agents can be of any race or gender. The only thing is they would all be trained Ben' Hassrath."

With the barest glance to confirm her hypothesis by his pleased smile she continued, getting lost in her train of thought. "Iron Bull will need to train a 'witch' hunting unit and then a unit to control that unit, uhhh! Do you even know how much I wish I could just ignore that, though, now? He will have to be directly in charge of it and only report straight to me…. There are days… I wish I could just… gahh! I hate being this stupid shemlem puppet."

Elystaa sat there for a heartbeat silently thinking on the words she almost said 'I want to run away.' Would it really be so bad if she was to walk out? Just pack her hart down and walk out under the portcullis without fanfare. She gave them so much already, owed them nothing.

Here? Now? Demand Solas let her join him? There was nothing but a few goodbyes to hold her back. Most of them would understand if it was with Solas and a letter would make the other forgive her.

Why not?! But she had to know first, she had to know the truth.

"The Qunari said the Inquisition was unknowingly working for an agent of Fen'Harel?" She stated her tone and straightened posture demanded an answer from the golden dressed Elvhen man before her.

"I gave no orders." He easily evaded.

"Solas!" Elystaa growled slightly, her hot breath came out quickly as she rolled her eyes at herself. "Please answer me, don't just…"

Elystaa glanced at Solas. "Never mind. It is obvious. Of course, you used the Inquisition infrastructure and contacts to further your goals, just as I would have." She waved her hands in the air around her head dismissively. "Moving on. We did need a home after Haven. You cannot tell me you knew of no other but, Tarasyl'an Te'las that would meet the Inquisitions needs. Not after all your years in the Fade or am I putting too much importance on my assumption that she used to be yours?"

Solas let out a small chuckle and caught her eyes with his, "How your mind works is still such a mystery to me. How you can take such small details and complete puzzles correctly is a feat of magic on its own. I think you already know the answer, though, ma'lath. I did give Skyhold to you, not the Inquisition after all. What is your next question? I promise not to elude it in anyway."

The question she hadn't wanted to ask because she was so afraid of the answer jumped to the fore of her mind and soon found its que on her tongue. Her heart began to pound inside her skull at the memories. As it always did of the evil magister and she felt like her mouth was full of gritty sand. Solas waited patiently with his hands behind his back and the crown of his head bowed, but his eyes never left hers. He knew what she was going to ask about, just not how.

"Corypheus?" After many moments that single word, laden as it was, was all the question he needed. Each syllable sent shudders through her. They made her relive the broken bodies and bloodless eyes. She still woke every night, sweating and trembling from the nightmares. Solas didn't know the final toll that battle had taken on her mind, body, friend, or followers.

"Ah yes… I had lain in a dark dreaming sleep while countless wars and ages passed, I awoke weakened. Nearly a year before I joined you. You must understand. I awoke in a world where the Veil I was entirely responsible for, blocked most people's conscious connection to the Fade. It was like walking through a world of Tranquil." He gestured sharply with one hand as he turned again to look out over the edge of the raised courtyard. The remains of an ancient Elvhen building stood in the distance hauntingly lovely and gloomy.

"We aren't even people to you?" Elystaa asked after she had been silent for a moment to recover her calm or as close as she was going to get to it. Tears streamed silently down both cheeks glistening in the light as Solas turned back to her.

His eyes softened and he took a step to her and then remembered himself. Fen'Harel the general, the leader, not Solas the lover. "Not at first. You. You were what changed everything. You showed me I was wrong…again."

"I had to do something to correct my mistake I found some of my priest still in the deep sleep of our people like Mythal's sentinels. I barely had enough power to awaken them. My foci was designed to gather power for me without cruelty or use of life. The orb had built up magical energy while I lay unconscious for millennia. I was not powerful enough to open it. The plan was for my agents to allow the Venatori to locate it and for Corypheus to unlock it and the resulting explosion to kill him. I did not foresee a Tevinter Magister having learned the secret of effective if crude immortality. It should not have gone the way it did. The world should have been purified of one such as he and my orb unlocked. Then I would have claimed it and the mark you now bear. I would have entered the Fade and torn down the Veil. As this world burned in the raw power and chaos, I would have been able to restore the world of my time… the world of the Elvhen." The careful face he canted towards hers was a moment from shattering and they both knew it. One wrong word and both their worlds would end.

Elystaa didn't want it to end, ever. She agreed that this world would never accept Elves unless they had the power to make themselves feared. She had seen that all her life. If that was his plan then, what was his new plan? The one where Elves of today follow him, could she live with him maybe help guide him to softer methods? She couldn't even blame him for his actions of when he first awoke because of her experience in Redcliff. Had she, herself, not murdered a whole world to make hers the 'real' one?

"I understand, ma' lath" She said as a wave of dizziness passed over her and she rethought standing and walking over to his side. She would rather him rage at her then see the look he now wore it broke her heart. Shattered even the shards to dust, then that dust scattered to the wind.

"That does not make what comes next any easier. My people fell for what I did to strike at the Evanuris down, but still some hope remains for restoration. I will save the Elvhen people, even if it means this world must die."

He stood before her strong and proud. Either she had to speak in this very moment or she would lose him forever. With everything she had in her, she pushed herself from the stone and wobbled to him on legs painted with rivulets of her own blood. Even her dunking earlier had done little to rid her of the thick dried fluid.

To Solas' surprise, she placed both her palms flat on his metal covered chest piece mirroring the pose of an Elvhen bride as he himself had shown her in a rare tomb they had studied one cold evening.

"Let me help you, Solas." She tried to put every ounce of sincerity, of belief, of trust. She could into those words for him to understand.

He felt himself waver under her shining eyes. If he allowed it, she would follow him into the Void itself. "I cannot do that to you, Vhenan," He said softly as he gathered her pliant hands in his and held them tightly as if he could protect them inside that metal cocoon.

A scowl crossed her features, dipping between her brows and tightening her lips. "But you would do it to yourself? I cannot bear thinking of you alone. Var lath vir suledin."

Abruptly she found her lips claimed by his. Then the familiar sweep of his tongue across her lips begging for more and she gave it to him, gladly. Her senses drowned in the taste, feel, and smell of him. The ever present scent of rain sprinkled dust danced along her nose and she moaned into his open mouth from that alone. Petrichor, such a subtle fragrance wrapped in a quickly fading moment of time, just like him it held a lingering moment of melancholy for a time before wreathed in golden light. Frantically kissing under the pines in Stormcoast. Stealing a peck during a light sprinkle while riding down a dust road to another battle. Having made love in skyhold's highest tower with the thin glass windows thrown open to the storm, with nothing between them and the tempest but heated silk. She was drawn into memories of being in his arms, but even in those brief drizzly moments, a memory could never be like this, like him. Another sweep of his hot muscle in her mouth and she felt her hair fall heavy down her back as he magic-ed away the pins. She pressed her body harder to his and his armor cut into her body. She nearly chuckled as she felt one of his long thighs slip between her own to hoist her up at a better angle for him to feast at their lips. At the same time that firm limb between her own brushed against her center sending small shocks into her. He was like a man starved and she was no better.

His power blazed off her bare skin where it was unprotected by her armor even though she wasn't a mage and should have been unaware of the sensation. It was a pleasant sensation, one she could imagine licking across her bare skin in a much more intimate setting. Even if he could not direct it the ever-present aura was a pleasurable feeling. Was this what he was like at the height of his power? Seductive grace and magnetic aura? And all that before he opened his mouth and his smooth intellect came into play? A small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth at the thought of the throngs of women that must have thrown themselves at him.

A sharp crackle accompanied the pain of the mark returning and she pulled her lips from his to cry out in agony. Solas stared at the green glow uncomprehending for a moment before his eyes grew wide and the sadness seeped back into them. Slowly he lowered them both to a dry patch of ground. Solas crouched before her as his heart clenched watching her legs send her all but sprawling before he had to turn his back on her once more.

Tears of pain and rejection cascaded down both round cheeks and dripped onto her leather vest. She slowly slumped to the ground without his support her body was barely able to keep her head up. Elystaa cradled her marked arm to her chest as it disintegrated in her grasp. She pulled her knees to her chest as Solas did something behind his back with a small flash of light and another wave of pain ripped through the mark.

"We are running out of time. The mark will eventually kill you. Drawing you here gave me the chance to save you … at least for now." He slowly regarded her, once again his cool composed mask in place more for his benefit than hers. She knew but to see it hurt more than it should. Staring into her eyes, he knelt at her side and using a small blade from his belt he opened her leather armor with a single stroke, from shoulder to wrist then folded it back neatly. The thick leather that protected her from broadsword and ballista alike parted easier than fresh honeycakes. She had never seen the blade's equal and here she was dying.

The damage was even worse than she had imagined. Her arm up to the elbow was made up of minute battling motes of green debris. Conjured from the Fade of many different shades the deeper you went but lighter for bone. The effect was horrific. Solas gripped her healthy arm above the corruption. She had to turn her head from the pain and fear. But instead, of the cold bite of metal, she felt the curious sensation of… nothing. Solas moved swiftly, another jiggle of her arm and more nothing but further down. After a while, Elystaa felt brave enough to look once again and gasped at what she saw. Her skin from just above her elbow down to the tips of her fingers was melded tight into small silver scales. He was just affixing the last few fingertip scales in place, then ran his glowing palms over the entire length of her new skin.

"Yes they are your skin now and they reflect the Mark's power back into itself, perpetuating a cycle," He said as if he read her mind. "Sensation, I am afraid, will always be lacking. Though some shall return." He looked as if he wanted to say something more but instead stood and began to walk over to the large Eluvian. He activated it with a wave. "It would be best if I were to leave now."

"NO! No, it won't! Please let me come with you ma' lath!" She snapped. Her hard-won calm and patience of years, frayed and came undone in an instant. No matter how little time she had left with the man that was her heart she would take every second she would get by any means she could. She had been through so much, why would the thought of facing the end of the world alone without him break her like this? Perhaps it was just the end of her endurance. Everyone has their limits and she had reached hers, Solas just didn't know it yet. But he would learn.

"I walk the Din'anshiral. There is only death on this journey. I would not have... " Solas said as he began to leave through the open portal.

"I guarantee if you stroll through that Eluvian my Din'anshiral will be considerably shorter than your stroll."

Solas stopped to peer around at her, where she held the wickedly curved blade he had used to cut open her jacket against her throat. Her mind buzzed. Much like the moment, she took down Corypheus, it was all or nothing. No bluffing, all truth.

"You would not," He said hands behind his back as he paced sedately towards her.

"You are willing to bet?" She asked between a sob and a cackle.

"I do bet that I can take your weapon from you, yes ma' lath." He paced closer slowly like you would to a wild or wounded animal.

"You left me a forest of weapons and once you walk away there is nothing to stop me. Then or ever again. You get it? I am only safe by your side, I am only complete by your side!" She gestured to the lower courtyard behind them. She needed him to see the eyes that she looked down from her throne with, the eyes that never wavered.

"Vhenan, I know you would not do this."

"Do you? You haven't been there for the nightmares, for the days and days, I won't eat anything but your stupid cakes. If the world is coming to its end I will do so by your side or by my own hand. I can't do this alone anymore!" Her voice fractured as she wept at the thought of each of them alone fighting on against each other, she couldn't take it. Not the pretty tears shemlem think elves cry but big gasping sobs of terror. Once he got closer she could see the real unadulterated terror reflected in his eyes. She watched him swallow then kneel to one knee next to her slowly and when he held out his hands she dropped the knife to the side and flung herself the best she could into his arms.

"Tell me you didn't just go so far out of your way to save my life, to walk out of it, now. Again. You are my… Vhenan, no… more… than that you are the other half to my soul and when you left. I … don't leave me again, please. Please?" She begged. Fully enveloped by the metal of his arms and chest. He held her and whispered to her. Solas spoke to her in elvehn to low, fast, and melodious for her to translate until the hardest of her sobs subsided.

"No. I would not see you die because of me. Not by my hand or yours. Ma' Vhenan." He said as he slipped his other arm beneath her knees and lifted her into his arms. "If this is your will, I require an oath. Swear to me, you will never attempt or threaten to take your own life again." He admonished as he adjusted his firm grip on her trembling body.

She clung to him and shivered. The battle of wills had done her little good and with her head on Solas' chest, she nearly missed the play of words her lover chose to use. "Solas… I will so swear if you swear in return that that as I accompany you until the Very End, and that you will keep an open mind for other ways to give the people back their heritage."

Solas stopped and thought on her words there was no true threat in intelligent discussion and debate. "Ma' Ely, Ma nuven 'ma rajathe, I will even seal it with a kiss."

Elystaa tilted her chin up to capture his lips with her own and between passes of his lips over hers, she repeated the ancient oath back to him. "Solas Ma'Vhenan. Sometimes when no good options are left good men and women must do things that they would rather not, to do what is right. Perhaps as we go along this walk together we will find a better way. Perhaps not but at least, we tried." His eyes looked through hers and into her soul once more. Something inside him searched for and found its pairing inside her and his lips softly brushed hers again growing with need and urgency.

Eventually, her shivers reminded him she needed more healing than what he had given here. That they should make their way through the open portal waiting for them and to a camp where a warm fire hot food and dry bedding could be found. Elystaa wouldn't be averse to skipping everything just to peel them both out of their perspective armor and see him in her arms again after two long years. She knew he could always make a special celebratory reunion for them in the fade after all. Just as he stepped into the portal she leaned up and whispered for the Dread Wolf to take her. His only reply before the portal closed was a dark chuckle.


End file.
